Liverpool meet FC Midtjylland, an innovative club, playing in the Danish Super Liga. They are Danish champions (have been for 3 years) and meet Liverpool, tonight, in the UEFA Champions League. The club, the club founded in 1918 is located between towns of Herning Fremad (pop:50,000) and Ikast FS (founded in 1935) on the mid-western part of Jutland. The club was formed through the merger of the two settlements' clubs, previously intense rivals, in 1999, only 21 years ago. The financial investment came from "locals", Johnny Rune, a wood supply industrialist and Steen Hessel, a Mercedes Benz dealer. The club is nicknamed "The Wolves".
Once merged and with funds put into a new stadium, the club quickly rose to become Danish Champions (three times recently) and are now heading for greater things.
The majority shareholder is Matthew Benham, who has owned the Danish Club since 2014. His approach to the club will bring "Moneyball" to mind (if you know what that means?).
Oxford educated and a life long Brentford fan, Benham also took over the majority share of the West London club where he very quickly brought success, but not quite enough yet to lift the unfashionable club into the top flight. He is convinced that this will be possible, so he sacked the seemingly successful Head Coach, Mark Warburton, and modelled his club on "the continental structure” with a Head Coach and a Sporting Director, both working towards maximising the efficiency of their players. Brentford's present Head Coach is Dane, Thomas Frank, once of Bronby FC and of course Midtjylland.
Midtjylland chairman is Rasmus Ankersen, once a youth player, was club coach in 2014 and Chairman at 37 years old. He is also an author, consultant and a director at Brentford FC. Important link.
There is a mathematical approach (hence the "Moneyball" likeness) to the way the club is run, ideas formulated by Benham in his career as a hedge fund operator and professional gambler. The numbers do not lie. He invested £6.2 million in 2014 in the club. His system's analysis company is "Smartodds", a huge database on all of Europe's footballers.
The club now has an excellent scouting system covering a 100 Danish junior clubs and this provides new blood for its thriving academy. There is a partnership with the Nigerian club, FC Ebedei and the club has links with various South American clubs and mid ranking European clubs. It has also become the first Danish club to sell the naming rites of the stadium, the MCH Arena, to a national company.
Both Brentford and Mitjylland now answer to mathematical models, which accurately account for the success and a failure of players and team movements. Key Performance Indicators, long used in business, are monitored for every player and team plays. Dangerous Situations are recorded, for example, the success rate in the danger zone, that area between the six yard box and the D on the penalty area. 77% of goals in the Premier league come from there. The FA might call this Zone 14. Analysis allows players to understand where and how they will gain most success.
Set pieces for the Danes have a scoring rate of 0.88, second in Europe, whereas Arsenal can only manage 0.57 success rate. The "Throw In" coach, Thomas Gronnemark, was particularly important and was signed by Liverpool's Klopp in 2018. There is a "ball striking coach" and a coach who specialises in "set plays".
Texts and key messages are sent to the club's players, keeping them all updated of what needs to be achieved. There is a reliance on statistical models that exploit inefficiencies and errors of home players and their opposition, of course!
Finally, the scientific approach in the club, also encompasses medical inputs such as meditation, sleep science, neurology and urology. These inputs are no longer regarded as "gobbledy gook" and form the foundation of the club's DNA.
Small clubs have to gain an advantage some how, when their odds of winning are unfavourable, minute preparation helps, especially when there is not much to lose for the underdog! Small clubs will not beat a big club every time but they might once in a while with an attention to detail.
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